Members 5,500 Founded 1877 Parent organization St John Ambulance | Headquarters Cardiff, United Kingdom Area served Wales | |
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Type Charitable organisation
Limited company Focus First aid, Medical care, humanitarian relief, youth programmes, Location Priory House,
Beignon Close,
Ocean Way,
Cardiff,
Wales,
CF24 5PB,
United Kingdom Services First aid training, passenger transport, first aid supplies Motto Pro Fide; Pro Utilitate Hominum; (Latin for For the Faith and In the Service of Humanity) Profiles | ||
St John Cymru-Wales (Also called St John Ambulance Wales and the Priory of Wales for the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem) is a charity (registered in England and Wales) dedicated to the teaching and practice of first aid. It is a subsidiary charity of the Priory of Wales (that is, the Welsh branch) of the wider international Order of St John.
History
The medieval Order of St John is the original inspiration of the modern Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem. As part of its charitable work, the Order founded three separate charities in the nineteenth century. One was an eye hospital in Jerusalem. The other two were the St John Ambulance Association (1877) and the St John Ambulance Brigade (1887) providing, respectively, first aid and nursing training, and first aid and nursing work by trained volunteers. The two organisations merged around a hundred years later into the single St John Ambulance organisation.
In 1907 King Edward VII, as Sovereign Head of the Order, authorised the foundation of different 'priories' of the Order for different nations. The first to be founded was the Priory of Wales (1918), which in turn led to St John Ambulance in Wales becoming a separate organisation and charity from the English parent body.